


if i swallowed my paper and ink (could i speak what i draw?)

by orphan_account



Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Future, Developing Relationship, Future Fic, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-03-26
Updated: 2015-03-26
Packaged: 2018-03-17 03:45:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,051
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3514151
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>kise sometimes believes in fate. especially when it walks him to tall guys who have rainbow tongue piercings and wear (il)legally tight trousers and want to hold him and press kisses to his nape while he awakens to the warmth of the April sun.</p>
            </blockquote>





	if i swallowed my paper and ink (could i speak what i draw?)

Kise’s running late, again. He’s just about swallowed the rest of his oatmeal and stuffed a banana down his throat when he looks at his clock for only the second time that morning to realise that he has around an hour and thirty minutes to get to the studio and fifteen minutes of that time would probably be wasted in running (briskly walking, actually, because running would mean air resistance and air resistance always, _always_ meant his hair would look terrible by the time he arrived wherever, and who on earth wants a model who is 1. Never punctual and 2. Looking like they’d spent the last three days in an underground factory with no air conditioning). If Kise calculates it correctly- and maths has never been his strong point- he’ll have slightly over ten minutes to freshen up, three to call his boss to tell him he’s going to be late, another minute to calm the poor guy down and try to assure him that the excellency of his shoot would make up for all of it. Hopefully the rest of the time should be enough for travelling, but even he wouldn’t rely on his terrible arithmetic.

Honestly, it was the worst time to have his car break down.

(Not that he didn’t like travelling by public transport in fact, he had managed to convince his boss to let him travel in public, because his fans were so much more important than his own well-being, obviously. And he _enjoyed_ being like everyone else, treated as an equal.)

He opts for a simple, figure hugging beige jumper combined with skinny black jeans- who even cared about his clothes, anyway? He’d be modelling for a new fashion line today, so he doubted he’d have to spend long in his own attire. Sliding a pair of shades over his eyes, he rushes out the front door, forgetting to do a final check of his face in the mirror and locking it behind him. It’s early and the streets are already crowded, bustling with life. Kise groans internally and starts ducking in and out of the crowd, apologising every now and then at another commuter for accidentally barging into them- accepting some abuse along the way. He trips over his own feet a couple of times and blames his clumsiness on some completely innocent passer-by, glaring at them through his tinted glasses, not that they could see his expression.

Eventually, he does make it to the station and checking his watch he realises he’s two minutes ahead of schedule. That might just be something to celebrate, Kise thinks, but in all fairness it really isn’t, considering that he was running late in the first place. Luck strikes him again when he sees his train zipping ahead of him, on the verge of stopping. He unapologetically shoves past a couple and a primary school class who seem to be on a trip and slips past the doors.

He doesn’t waste time in flinging himself into the nearest free seat and pulling his phone out, ignoring the frowns from the other passengers. Slamming in his phone code, he opens up camera, waiting for the momentary flash to reveal his face. It doesn’t. It gives him a view of his shoes instead, on the dark floor and expressing a shine much brighter than the one in reality. He scowls at the inconvenience (cursing himself for wanting to take so many photos of pretty skies and various posters showing his face) and switches the camera to the front view which presents him with his handsome, yet much hassled face. Staring at his reflection, he fixes his hair, rearranging strands over and over. He really did need to make up for not looking at his face before he had left- his hair was a total mess. A sigh escapes through his mouth as he looks up, smiling at the old woman sitting across from him, before he looks back at his phone. Hair, check. Earring, check. Subtle eyeliner, check. Perfect. Grinning, he takes a photo and his eyes turn into slits as he sees something poking through from the back of his chair.

It’s brown, a sandpaper colour, and Kise turns to see what it is exactly. It’s a pretty sophisticated pad, a notebook of some sort. It’s worn, Kise can see that, but it still looks so classy and jaunty it immediately spikes interest in him. He wants to look through it, though he knows it’s best to respect their privacy. He also wants to return it though, so he checks the inside cover for any sign of identity. There’s a number scrawled at the top of the front of the book along with a ‘If found contact me at.’ Kise’s curiosity nearly gets the better of him, but he shakes his head and places the pad into his bag, grumbling when a flood of papers fall out when he holds it vertically. The papers that fall out feature sketches, profiles of women mostly, but Kise spots a few of men. He holds the sheets between three fingers while he zips up his bag, already forgiving himself for invading this _artist’_ s privacy. They’re beautiful. Breathtaking. You can see the effort in each stroke and line, and Kise just marvels. He flicks through each sheet, filled with various different faces, some done in monotone pencil and others sporting vibrant colours. The last sheet Kise looks at is an emotion study, several different profiles donning different reactions, some crying, some beaming, and some just staring into the distance. The artist’s only used grey, with a blinding yellow for the hair, and it takes Kise a good half minute of gaping to register that the sketches are of him. He lets out a tiny gasp when he realises, seeing the earring and the eyeliner and the hair which the artist has captured _so very_ well and he needs to stop himself from screaming. Ignoring basically everyone else on the train, he drops the papers into his lap and covers his mouth, overcome with emotion. Sure, he’s seen art of him before, but this- wasn’t this what people called fate?

Yeah, this had to be fate. Kise was going to hunt down this artist and scream his lungs out at them at how stunning their work was. He just needed to get off this damn train.

*

As predicted, Kise arrives at the studio late and immediately receives a huge, monstrous telling off from his manager. Kasamatsu doesn’t want to hear any of his excuses though - he’s used to bad punctuality and the whiny blonde’s useless excuses, alongside the fact that his cheery disposition typically got him everything he wanted.

“Come on, senpai! Just pull a few strings and make sure they’re not angry, please?”

Kasamatsu sighs. “I swear, this is the last time I let you travel by any means of transport that isn’t private. You’re absolutely useless, Kise.”

“Senpai! I’m not useless! Surely you couldn’t pull off this modelling thing, right? I really can’t ima-”

He gets a firm smack round the back of his head.

“Don’t assume anything, Kise. I’d probably be a more talented, and definitely more punctual model than you anyway. It’s just smiling into the camera, right? Simple.”

Kasamatsu flashes a very fake smile at Kise to prove his point before ushering the pouting blond into the studio, briefing him to a couple of the staff before letting him get carried away to hair and makeup.

It’s a routine Kise knows oh too well.

*

It isn’t until halfway through the shoot when the photographers and makeup artists have left for lunch when Kise gets a moment to himself. He quite likes the collection he’s modelling for, all pastel and soft, pinks and blues and tans. He likes the way he looks in them too, which gives him a random urge to shop halfway through the shoot.

 During his lunch break, he takes the sketchbook out of his bag and opens it, skimming through the pages. Despite his promise to not look through the book, his curiosity definitely got the better of him as he did so. The first couple are empty, except for a large mug stain and a scribble, but the rest are filled with sketches. They aren’t people though, not like the pencil drawings of people on the separate sheets. They’re animals- wolves and horses and lions and tigers and insects Kise has never seen before. Each has their Latin name written beside it, and he takes care to try pronounce them out loud, despite not really knowing how to. His efforts seem to impress his makeup artist though, who is standing beside him and Kise is completely oblivious to her watching him.

“Are these yours, Kise?”

Kise looks up to her from his seated position and grins. “I wish they were.” She gives him an assuring nod and smile in return.

“I’m pretty sure your art isn’t terrible.”

“Trust me, you haven’t seen me draw.” He hears her sigh and walk away and Kise scrunches his nose at how she doesn’t really acknowledge him, or try to socialise with him- then again, small talk isn’t really for everyone. He pulls his phone out also, flicking back to the front page of the book and dialling the number written there into his phone. The beeps sound in his ears and Kise is forced to wait a few seconds before anyone picks up- and when they do it’s a low, gruff voice.

“Yo- kinda busy, so make it snappy, yeah?”

It is very far from what Kise was expecting- wait, what was he expecting? A girl, perhaps? Someone with decent manners? Who knows..?

“Hi- I- um- I found what I believe to be is your sketchbook on the train this morning- d’you think we could meet so I could return it to you?”

“…Uh, yeah. Sure- whatever. Couldn’t you just like, put it in the post or something though? Wouldn’t that be quicker?”

Kise taps his foot impatiently against the leg of his chair. Was this guy serious? Send it through the post?

“You know, you’re probably right- but I’d really love to meet you in person, if you don’t mind. Anyone who draws like this needs to be recognised, and you don’t know how happy I’d be to meet you.” He’s nervous now- Kise has never actually offered to meet up with anyone this easily before- especially a stranger. But doing a good thing for a talented person should require at least a face to face meeting- in Kise’s books anyway. Besides, what harm would it do to surprise a fan every once in a while?

There is a long, almost hesitant sigh on the other side of the line- Kise’s reason to stop tapping his foot and start listening again.

“Okay….Fine. Whatever. What’s your name, by the way? And where d’you wanna meet?” The guy was definitely sticking to what he’d started the conversation with- his questions were very quick and snappy.

“Uh, Kise. And I don’t really mind, I’m totally flexible. Wherever’s closest to you.” Kise can practically hear him rolling his eyes. The guy mutters the name of a café before changing his mind and going with a different café, and Kise nearly manages to catch the name and scrawl it onto his hand. He’s never heard of it before- probably one of those obscure ones that served pastries Kise wouldn’t dream of tasting- that is, not your typical on the high street coffee shop. The guy murmurs the address after without mistake, as if he remembers it _all_ like his name or his own address. He even gives a few details about himself- “I’ll probably be wearing a hat. Glasses maybe. Just don’t make it obvious that you’re meeting me.”-the last sentence confuses Kise (a lot) and he tries to convince himself to forget about it (which he doesn’t, and ends up attempting to figure out what the guy means while picking out a whole new disguise for himself).

“It’s a date.” They say, nearly simultaneously, once they’d chucked the rest of the plan together.

It has Kise blushing because as much as he’d hate to admit it, he would melt in that voice forever if he could.


End file.
